The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1887-07-12
alaLlomANIA IN NEW YORK.
A Second Hand Booksellers Tells of His
Patrons PecuIiarities.

Patrons Peculiarfties.
There prevails an impression that any
one who really knows a valuable book
when he sees it can go about the second
hand book stores and pick up bargains in
plenty. This is altogether a mistaken
notion The trouble is that so many do
know good book when they see it and
so are on the lookout for rare copies.
Booksellers, too-at least majority of
them-now know the relative values of
books, and he is a lucky collector who
nowadays gets a volume much under its
actual worth. OF course different per-
sons set different values on certain works.
But as rule the dealer's price is not often
thought to be low.
A down town bookseller who deals in
all kinds of books, old and new, said to
the writer who asked him for a certain
edition of an old classic tAa other day:
If that book were here it would have
been sold long before this. We have had
half dozen men in here already to-day,
looking for rare old books. You have no
idea how many come in every day on that
errand. They come in and spend an
hour, sometimes two. looking over our
shelves. They rarely tell us what they
are after. There are some old gentle
times a week. They know our stock as
well as we do ourselves. Not one of them
buys more than half dozen volumes
year, but they seem to be quite satisfied
with what they get for their labor. Of
course we have a great many transient
callers on the same errand. 1t often
makes me laugh to see them looking wise
and eagerly going over the shelves, evil
IDENTIFY under the impression that they are
in unexplOred fields. just as likely as
not some one, who knows a good thing
when he sees it, has been all over the
books half an hour before. Some of them
take every volume in their hands and
turn over few pages. A good many
come in just to have look at the books.
There are inscriptions dealers, and when
they see that a man wants particular
book they raise the price on him.
But your regular book collector isn't
green. Many time have seen him try
ing to get a valuable edition of some book
by pretending that it was common, de-
pending on the dealers ignorance not to
know its worth. / remember once had
volume of the 'Tattler - that was very
old and worn, and / thought it was worth
adj of SIS. / hadn't it long when one of
my old visitors came in. He knew nearly
all my stock and he must have seen this
"Tattler - at once, but he passed it by
without so much as touching it. Then he
came back and, contrary to his custom,
remarked that he didn't see anything he
wanted. He was just going out of the
door when he suddenly turned round and
said that he had forgotten to get Doc,
that his wife wanted. While was wrap
ping it up he picked up the volume of the
To in
.'Ah, here is another of these copies of the
'Tattler.' It's a good deal like the one
have at home, but mine is worn out.
This one is only little better, but you
will be sure to let me have it cheap and
might as well take it along"
''Just as you like, - replied, carelessly.
'fYou can have it for So OF course, he
was thunderstrucb; surely, was making
a mistake, and all that sort of thing But
I wouldn't bulge, and he gave me~ my
price with very bad grace The fact is,
these old collectors don't half care for a
book unless they get it at price they
think away below cost. Then they go
away chuckli-g 1ss -~',~+ flow call their
superior discernment.
Where do you get these old books 2"
was asked.
''From the libraries of these very men
who collect them. When they die their
libraries are often sold with the rest of
their effects, and usually at ridiculously
low figures. The men who buy old fur
niture cften get them for nothing slowed
away in drawers. Anyhow, they sell for
very little when disposed of by an auc-
tioneer who knows nothing about them.
You see, most of our customers are COM
paratively poor men, who often get
book that they prize at the sacrifice of a
meal. Cor. New York Commercial Ad-
vertiser.